EN: More and more Saudi women are travelling to neighbouring countries to
take driving lessons, even though their new licence is not valid back home
It’s about more than just learning how to drive. It is the lifestyle of freedom and opportunities that attracts Saudi women to Dubai : here they can work and live on their own, or simply dress the way they want.

EN: As Europe continues to grapple
with slow economic growth, thousands of French families are moving overseas
each year. But ensuring their children
receive a French education is proving to be a challenge. Many
of the French schools in their host countries are overcrowded, forcing some
children to have to temporarily leave the French sytem. With government budget cuts, some parents are now turning to the private sector
to develop the network of French schools across the world. This
is particularly the case in Dubai.

EN : Dubai’s construction workers rarely find time
for leisure. But Camp Ka Champ is an exception. This Bollywood song
contest was created 8 years ago just for them. There are now more than
80 camps participating across the UAE. Bollywood is a world of glamour
and glitter close to the hearts of the 3000 contestants, who can easily
relate to the movie songs. Moments of joy and nostalgy.

Video in ENGLISH

Video en FRANÇAIS

Ashraful, Semi finalist at the 2012 edition sings a Bollywood song for us, a capela

----------

EN: Dubai, a new heaven for the French with Arab background?FR: Dubai, un eldorado pour les Français d'origine maghrébine?

The National newspaper

Bidding farewell doesn't have to be bitter, as long as you follow the right steps.

For
most people, leaving the UAE to return home, or to begin a new life
somewhere else, is a considerable challenge. But it’s an eventual
reality for most expatriates.Since moving to the Emirates, odds
are you know someone who has moved on. Perhaps they accepted an
exciting career opportunity, became homesick, or were made redundant in
the wake of the financial downturn.

Whatever the reason,
slogging through paperwork, packing, paying the bills, looking for
health insurance, and taking the children out of school can be a costly
headache.

To avoid the hassle – and the debts – some people choose to do a runner, jumping on a plane with no intention of coming back. But this is hardly a prudent option, nor is it an ethical one. Expatriates
who abscond from debts could be blacklisted from re-entering the
country for years to come – if not forever. And as soon as you enter an
Emirati airport, even in transit, you could end up having problems with
the local authorities.

Absconding will also eliminate your end-of-service gratuity and
final payment, which in this country are linked to proper exiting
procedures.Fortunately, for the majority of us, departing from
UAE life is a sweet sorrow, and it pays to end your time here
responsibly. If you follow the right steps, the process can be
relatively painless.For Vincent Bouquain, a farrier at the Equestrian Club in Abu Dhabi, leaving the UAE has been smooth.

After
arriving from France in April 2009, Mr Bouquain, 38, found a job the
following month, and signed a one-year renewable contract. “But
before I finished my first year, I had to undergo back surgery for a
hernia, which got me stuck home for a month and a half,” he remembers.
“A staff member told me two months before the end of my contract, in
March, that it would not be renewed.”Despite the unpleasant
circumstances, two months’ notice was more than enough time for a
single man with no children to think about the future, update his CV
and plan the transition.

“Since I am living in a company flat, I will need to leave the
place, but they have not given me any deadline yet,” Mr Bouquain says.
“It is not like they are kicking you out.”As for the visa cancellation, he says his company is in charge of the procedure. “I
have no idea how long that will take, but so far nobody has asked me
for my passport and we are three weeks from the deadline,” he explains.
“The only thing I signed was the letter of non-renewal of my contract.”

Mr Bouquain also visited his bank and asked if his account could be
kept active. He’s leaving the UAE next month, but hopes to return in
mid-August to find another job. Therefore, the bank agreed to keep him
as a customer. “But I will need to cancel my credit card because it is linked to the employer,” he explains. “I can still keep my ATM card.”Mr Bouquain says he plans on leaving furniture with a friend, eliminating the hassle of shipping his possessions.

However, not all cases are this straightforward. Many expatriates
have far more variables to consider, such as children, pets, furniture
and outstanding loans. And since we are all different, each one of us
will have to deal with unique situations and challenges.For example, Laura, a teacher at a British school in the capital, is worried about her faithful, long-term maid.The
40-year-old Briton preferred to withhold her full name, as she has yet
to inform her employer that she’ll be leaving in the near future.

“She has been with us for almost eight years taking care of the
kids,” say Laura, the mother of two children, aged eight and three.
“The maid is part of the family now. It breaks my heart to have her
sent back to her home country because I know that she does not want
that. But if we leave we should put an end to our sponsorship.”Indeed,
Laura will be legally obligated to do so by visiting the immigration
department. Both she and the maid must present their passports and the
maid’s labour card.

Another expat, Philip Agius, a 39-year-old architect from Australia,
had a hard time selling his car and closing his bank account when he
left the Emirates last summer.“I was very conscious all the time about having any debt left when I arrived at the Abu Dhabi Airport,” he says. “I was just paranoid about it because of the stories I have heard about being caught and who knows what.”Mr
Agius had reasons to be concerned. In fact, he had two loans from his
bank – one that he took out to cover a six-month rent advance on his
apartment in Dubai, and the other for a car. He did not wish to reveal
how much money he owed.

“Selling my Ford Focus was a nightmare,” he remembers. After
posting a handbill advertisement on a Spinneys bulletin board, Mr Agius
received incessant phone calls from people for weeks offering what he
considered to be ridiculously low sums of money for his car, a 2005
model.“They were all telling me that I would never get more
than Dh12,000, because there are so many cars on the market and
everybody is leaving,” he explains.

Mr Agius held out, and was eventually rewarded for his patience, selling the 2005 Focus for Dh20,000. But other problems soon presented themselves to the departing expatriate. His car was registered in Dubai, while the buyer lived in Abu Dhabi. Therefore, Mr Agius had to transfer the registration.“I am lucky I was not working, because it took me three days of my time,” he remembers, saying the process was arduous.

Mr Agius took the car to the Dubai registration office, where he was
required to fill out several forms. His license plate was then removed,
and a special temporary plate was issued to him. Next, he
drove down to Abu Dhabi, picked up the buyer and processed the rest of
the paperwork and registration at the licensing department in the
capital. Of course, Mr Agius had to pay off his car loan
before he could actually sell the vehicle, and he had to spend his
end-of-service gratuity payment to do so.

He experienced other hiccups with his bank. At one point, after
salary transfers from his employer ended and he still had loans with
outstanding balances, the bank froze all of his accounts. Mr Agius says
he had to visit the bank and have an extended meeting with several
representatives to explain the situation.Even his final airport
experience was a hassle. As Mr Agius approached the check-in counter,
thinking all his troubles were behind him, the attendant told him he
was carrying excess luggage to the tune of about 10 kilograms.

“I had to either pay an exorbitant amount to take it on the plane,
or go to a special counter where I can send it by post,” he says.For
Dh14 per kilogram to New York, or Dh10.30 to London, Etihad Crystal
Cargo, for example, will ship your excess luggage. Note that it will
take three to five days for you to receive it on the other end,
including flight and customs.The whole process of exiting the
country took Mr Agius a good six weeks. But in the end, after a
meaningful and productive time in the Emirates, he is happy to be home.

“It has been very tough going home,” he says. “I have been back for
nearly a year and I have worked only six months of it. I only got a
full-time job recently. But although it was a tough transition, it has
been really enjoyable.”

Deciding when to leave

If
you have children, it makes the most sense to move three to six weeks
before your destination country’s school year starts (and bachelors
might want to avoid another summer here).But the vagaries of contract employment in the UAE can make choosing when to go difficult.Leaving
before the end of your contract, for instance, could leave you owing
your sponsor for some benefits, such as previously paid air tickets or
bonuses.

Furthermore, if your company paid the cheque on your flat, you will
be responsible for the balance if you leave before the end of that
contract. Because your housing and employment terms may end at
different times, it becomes an exercise in damage control to figure out
whom you would owe less if you had to choose.You can mitigate
some of these problems by asking your company and your landlord about
finding a replacement tenant. Note that this isn’t a right, especially
if your landlord has banned this in your housing contract.

Never expect to sever all your ties with your sponsor in just a day
or two. Even the most ambitious departure plan will take at least a
couple of weeks to implement.And it’s always important to plan
for the possibility that your end-of service benefits won’t come when
you expect them, especially if your post-resignation relationship with
your employer is less than cordial. If you’re worried about your flight
home, it might be beneficial to plan your departure at off-peak travel
times.

Another transport consideration is your
“exotic cargo” – different destinations have different rules for
handling pets, for instance. Most airlines won’t ship your best friends
when the temperature either in the Emirates or at your destination
airport rises over a certain comfort level.Finally, consider
the tax liability at your destination. If you move to your new country
in the middle of a tax year, you may be responsible for taxes on all of
your income that year – even what you’ve earned in the UAE!

It may not be easy to leave at the “perfect” time, but sacrificing
small benefits here or there can help avoid major liabilities later.

Bank matters

Making sure your financial affairs are in order is perhaps the most essential step before moving on from the Emirates.When
you cancel your work visa, your company is expected to notify all of
your banks of your imminent departure, and any final salary payments
must be marked as such by law. Be warned – if you have
outstanding debts, your bank accounts and credit cards will be frozen
immediately until the amount is cleared, or until the institution is
notified that you have the means to make the necessary payments.The
point of freezing your account is to ensure that there are funds in
place to cover any debts. Some banks will take a lump sum from your
current account and place it in a temporary holding account to guard
against your possible absconding.

In order to receive your final salary or severance package, your
employer may also ask you to produce a “No Liability Certificate”
stating that you have no outstanding loans or credit card bills that
your bank may try to force the company to pay if you default. But keep
in mind that, depending on the bank’s procedures, obtaining this
clearance can take two days – or two months.You are also
expected to close bank accounts and cancel credit cards before leaving,
because they have been opened under the sponsorship of your employer.
This will also take a couple of days. Be sure to take your passport to
the local branch, along with all your banking information.

According to Antoine Mourad, a manager at the National Bank of Abu
Dhabi, you can subsequently open a non-resident account and deposit any
funds you wish. However, no chequebook is included, and your credit
card limit will likely be lower. The best advice, Mr Mourad says, is simply to plan ahead and get your financial house in order before taking the leap.Banks
are very reluctant to let you leave without clearing your debts, and
can even take preventive measures to ensure expatriates settle up. “If
somebody wants to leave the country with a loan and no intention to
pay, we inform the airport, and if he leaves we contact the collecting
agency abroad in his country,” Mr Mourad says.

Leaving your home

Housing
can be a tricky situation. If the lease is under the name of your
company (or accommodation is provided by the employer), you may need to
vacate the property just days after visa cancellation. This
time period will vary depending on your contract, and whether you have
good relations with the company. Therefore, it is a smart move to
determine where you stand, as you may need to make alternative housing
arrangements before leaving the country.

There are two loose ends you must tie up regarding housing. The
first: utilities. At least a week before flying out, plan to visit DEWA
or ADDC – each have several locations in their respective emirate – to
pay your bill and receive a utilities clearance certificate.

Be sure to take your passport along, as well as your DEWA or ADDC
reference number, which can be found on the utility meter at home. The
deposit you made when you first opened the account will be returned to
you, after being used to pay off any remaining balance on the bill.But
before acquiring your final clearance, DEWA and ADDC will send out a
representative to read your meter and clear up any remaining fees; this
typically takes a few days.

The second chore is your “media” – telephone, TV and internet. If
you have a landline, take a trip to Etisalat, get your telephone
disconnected, pay the final bill and receive a clearance certificate.Home
internet gets more complicated: you may need to wait for a technician
to come to your flat to physically disconnect you, which will take a
few days. Satellite subscription services, such as Orbit
Showtime or ART, will also require you to wait for a technician, or
even take your decoder box to a retail location.

Note that prepaid subscriptions, such as Wasel with Etisalat, do not
need to be cancelled. However, any kind of mobile subscription, such as
on your iPhone or Blackberry, must be cancelled in person at your local
Etisalat or du office.Finally, if you found your own apartment,
but your company paid the rent, you must provide a maintenance
clearance from the owner of your apartment, confirming that everything
is in good shape for the next tenant.

Cutting ties with your job

Whether you are resigning or being laid off, the minimal notice period is generally 30 days. Fortunately,
once you have passed this threshold, most of the bureaucracy should be
handled by the company – although you’ll need to be patient with your
own (much smaller) pile of paperwork.Of course, the company
will want copies of most of the clearance letters listed on this page,
including those from your bank, utilities provider and landlord. But
visa cancellation is the most important task.

First, the company will ask for your passport, along with the
passports of any family members living under your sponsorship. These
documents will then be taken to the Immigration Department, and when
they return the visa will be stamped as cancelled. This can take anywhere from a few days to two weeks. There is no charge for the process.But
once this step is complete, expatriates are suddenly on the clock. You
will have a maximum of 30 days to leave the country. If you exceed this
deadline, there is a charge of Dh25 per day for the first six months,
and up to Dh100 every day afterwards.

If you need extra time in the country to sort your affairs, one
helpful way to avoid fines if you come from a qualifying country is to
acquire a visitor’s visa at the airport, entitling you to an additional
30 days.In terms of transportation, your company will be expected to provide a one-way ticket to a location of your choosing.If
you have completed more than a year of service, you are entitled to an
“end-of service gratuity” or severance package, which amounts to a
minimum of 21 days of basic salary (listed on your contract) for each
of the first five years of continuous service, and 30 days for each
following year. Meanwhile, if you are laid off, you can expect a
severance equivalent to three months of basic salary.

Your final payment or severance package will be issued once your
work visa has been cancelled. Your sponsor will deduct the balance of
any unpaid loans or school/housing fees from this pay packet.Overall,
leaving your job is not complicated, but it is essential to budget your
time properly once the visa clock starts ticking.Good luck.

Shipping your stuff

Theoretically, shipping by sea
costs less than transporting your goods as air cargo, but important
considerations can bring the final prices much closer together than you
might think.Many items can’t be shipped by normal sea cargo,
such as pets (see next section), and furniture or other large pieces
would cost a fortune to send by air. First things first.
Categorise your belongings into lists of what you want to send onward
and what you want to bin, donate or sell. Many items are obviously one
or the other – for instance, that Dh300 Ikea sofa in your guest room
would cost much more than its actual value to ship.

Items you’re on the fence about selling may be worth an ad on souq.com or dubizzle.com to see what you are offered. It’s
best to ask several moving companies for quotations. Make sure that the
company gives a full door-to-door quotation. Some of them give
door-to-port quotations only, which would require you to separately
move your goods the rest of the way.There are different ways of
shipping goods by boat. Paradoxically, the larger and more voluminous
your stuff, the faster (albeit more expensive) sea shipping can be.

“If your volume is small, you can use a groupage and share with
others – but this can take about 15 to 18 weeks,” said Kevin Wieczorek,
the branch manager of Allied Pickfords. Most companies have
ever-larger options up to full shipping containers. According to Mr
Wieczorek, a family of four sending belongings and furniture would need
about 24 cubic metres of space, which would cost about Dh30,000 to ship
to the UK.

If you need it there faster, air is the way to go, but airline cargo
operations are much cheaper than popping your things in the post. Etihad
Crystal Cargo charges about Dh14 per kilogram to New York and Dh10.30
per kilo to London, although their office is at the airport, so
bringing your stuff there for a quote takes time. It takes three to
five days for you to receive your baggage, including flight and customs
clearance.Finally, consider sales tax or VAT liabilities. If your goods are relatively new, you may have to declare them with customs.

Cars and pets

To ship your car home, you must first
eliminate any outstanding loans. In fact, expats require a clearance
from the finance department, or your bank needs to certify that you
fully own the vehicle.The next step is to deregister the
vehicle from one of the Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) centres in
Dubai, or the Traffic and Licensing Department in Abu Dhabi on Al Saada
Street. Take your registration card with you, along with your driver’s
license and the license plate number. However, be sure all speeding or
parking fines are paid before arriving.

These authorities will then inspect of the vehicle and provide you with the paperwork needed to ship it overseas.Customs
clearance and delivery takes about five days to the UK and US.
Everything must be paid upfront. Fees will vary, but expect to pay at
least Dh10,000, and perhaps more depending on the location and size of
the car.Many people prefer to avoid the time and hassle of
shipping, and instead sell their car. Try posting an ad on online
marketplaces such as autosouk.com, uae-autos.com, autodealer.ae or
dubizzle.com.

While you may consider selling your vehicle rather than shipping it home, beloved pets are an entirely different matter. This process can be long and expensive, and you should consult a veterinarian, as rules vary based on your destination.Core
documents include a valid health and rabies inoculation certificate,
signed by a qualified veterinarian, so make sure these procedures are
up to date. Timing is especially important, because many countries,
such as the UK, will require a six-month waiting period after the most
recent shots before admitting the animal. If you enter the country
before this point, your pet may have to be quarantined.

A good place to look for pet shippers is The Independent Pet and
Animal Transportation Association International. Visit their website at
www.ipata.com for a list of companies worldwide.And at the end of the day, be prepared for a hefty expense. Shipping
your pet to the UK, including the price of a rabies test and travel
crate, is Dh13,279. Shipping to the US will cost about Dh15,000, while
Australia tops the list at nearly Dh18,000.

Taking kids out of school

If you have children at school, there are two main documents you must obtain prior to departure. The
first is a “report card”, or a certificate showing the grades the child
has received throughout the year. This record is essential for proper
placement in the next school he or she attends. The second
document is the official transfer letter, which will enable your child
to switch from their UAE school to one in your destination country.

“People just need to tell me beforehand, either by phone or in
person,” said Layal Saraieddin, a registration secretary at the ABC
Private elementary school in Abu Dhabi. “I will provide them with the forms, which takes usually about a week.”Once
you get the transfer letter from the school, there are still a few
other steps to take. You first need to have the letter signed by the
UAE Ministry of Education, then the embassy of your country.

Tuition fees are generally non-refundable. Each school has its own
policy, so make the appropriate inquiries ahead of time. Some charge
for tuition per quarter, some per term, and others want the entire
year’s tuition up front. You may be able to get some of your money
back, so why not ask?And note that it is important to think
about the schools at your destination. Decide whether your child needs
to go to a private school and whether you need to apply weeks or months
ahead of time to enter the school of your choice.

Also, as in the UAE, the school year varies from country to country.
Problems can arise if you pull your kids out at the end of the UAE
school year in May, only to find that the year began in April at your
destination.But remember, you can avoid any potential conflicts
simply by planning ahead. If you know you will be leaving your job a
few months into the school year, it might make sense to set your
children up at their next school ahead of time.

And consider hosting a party or setting aside time for your child to
socialise with friends, and encourage them to keep in touch. Moving to
a new place can be difficult for young people, and guidance on your
part could go a long way.

The announcement is testament to the UPC’s growing role
in supporting the property sector.The organisation was founded in 2007
and is responsible for Abu Dhabi’s urban environments.

Aldar Properties, the largest developer in the capital, was awarded
a Dh730 million deal to help build more than 1,000 homes for Emiratis
in Al Ain, while Al Qudra Real Estate, a smaller private developer, won
a Dh4bn contract to build 5,000 homes. Both are public housing projects
in Al Ain, the emirate’s second-largest city.

“The UPC is
delivering on its mission to develop the Emirate of Abu Dhabi,” said
Mahmood al Mahmood, the chief executive of Al Qudra Holding. “There is
a large gap for the national housing programme, and it will definitely
become bigger and bigger over time.”

Property developers have seen low sales for the past 18 months
because of the downturn, leading them to seek new ways of making money.
They have increased their rental portfolios, created property
management companies and sought more government contracts.

Al
Qudra will build the first phase of the Ain Al Fayda project, including
2,000 homes on 40.36 million square feet, at the base of Jebel Hafeet.
It will eventually reach 5,000 homes and house an estimated 60,000
people.

The
Aldar project, Shiebat Al Watah, will cover about 420 hectares and is
located near Ain al Fayda, about 10km to the south of the city centre.

Aldar will carry out major infrastructure work and hand over 1,045
serviced plots to Emiratis by April 2013, according to the company.

“Aldar
will construct the residences later on,” said Matar Mohammed Saif Al
Nu’aimi, the general manager of Al Ain Municipality. “We expect the
project to be completed in three years.” Aldar will also oversee the
development of educational, health and retail facilities.

The project will include 41km of internal roads and pedestrian
paths, a 45km water network system and a 32.5km sewerage system. Medium
and low-voltage power networks and a fibre-optic telecommunications
network are also being installed.

It is the second
infrastructure contract awarded to Aldar in Al Ain, after the
completion of Shabhat, another Emirati housing project close to the
city.“The Al Ain municipality expects to add about 11,000
residential units over the next five years in order to meet the
demand,” Mr al Nu’aimi said.

The Abu Dhabi Government last year increased efforts to provide
housing for UAE nationals. “The Government today has Dh25bn to develop
infrastructure and public housing for the Emiratis, to spend in the
coming two to three years,” said Falah al Ahbabi, the general manager
of the UPC. “But the [total] budget for Emirati housing is much greater
than Dh25bn. Emirati housing is the most important item for us right
now. It is a hot topic.”

According to the UPC, the Government plans to build 20,000 houses
for Emiratis in Al Ain over the next 20 years and more than 30,000 in
the capital.

---

Go-ahead for internet calls – but not Skype

Last Updated: March 16. 2010 12:53AM UAE / March 15. 2010 8:53PM GMT

Regulators
finally authorised Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) phone calls
yesterday – but with a catch. Only existing licence-holders may offer
VoIP, thus excluding popular services such as Skype.

The
Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) said it was making it
legal for people to place international calls through the internet, but
would allow only licensed operators to run such services. The four
companies licensed to offer international VoIP services are Etisalat,
du and the satellite firms Yahsat and Thuraya.

For consumers, that means the prices of any international internet
calls they make will be set by those companies. It is not yet clear
whether this will result in substantial cost-savings.

Companies
such as Skype, who are technically breaking the law by offering VoIP,
would have to go into partnership with one of these providers to enter
the market. “People look at VoIP as a technology or as a
tool,” said Mohammed Gheyath, the TRA’s executive director of
technology development affairs.

“The TRA looks at it as a service. And, as any service, it needs a licence to be provided. This is a mandatory requirement.”Steven
Hartley, the principal analyst at international telecoms consultancy
Ovum, said the ruling was “a step change, not a sea change”.“We
are not going to see Skype come in and be able to offer services unless
they can make an arrangement with the local providers,” he said.

Most
telecoms companies in the Gulf, fearing the loss of revenues from
international phone calls, have opposed allowing access to services
such as Skype, which use the internet to provide low-cost
telecommunications. Etisalat and du have until now been licensed to
offer VoIP services only for domestic calls within the country.

Skype
recently announced plans to open its first office in the Gulf as part
of its effort to end the ban on global internet telephone service in
many parts of the region.

Russ Shaw, the vice president of Skype for the Middle East and the
general manager of its mobile division, said the office would help the
company lobby regional governments and develop partnerships with
telecommunications operators.But Raghu Venkataraman, the chief
strategy and investments officer for du, ruled out such arrangements.
He said the company was looking to launch its own VoIP service this
year. “We can launch VoIP but we want to do it ourselves.”

Internet-based calls through Skype have been illegal in the UAE
since 2004 and the website is blocked, but Skype remains one of the
most popular ways for expatriates to communicate with family and
friends. Dan Stuart, 36, a Canadian internet entrepreneur in
Dubai, said the impact of the ruling on consumers depended on the
decisions of the major telecoms firms. “It could be a real cost-saver
for people, but it depends on what kind of a payment gateway they
introduce,” he said.Nathalie Gillet

Debt-ridden developers face prison or flight

Sharjah House of Justice, where Mr Sassen's case was heard. Nathalie Gillet / The National

Room
145 at the Sharjah House of Justice is crowded with lawyers, clerks and
the friends and relatives of the those about to appear before the
elderly judge.

In the back row, Elena Sassen, an elegant
Russian, is quietly waiting for her husband, Dirk, a 44-year-old
German, who once oversaw plans for a multimillion-dollar project as a
property developer in Ajman. Now he is sharing a 40-square-metre cell
with 27 other inmates, sleeping on the floor with only a woollen
blanket.

Like many of his cellmates, Mr Sassen is in jail because he wrote a cheque without sufficient funds to cover it.

When
two guards bring him into a glass partitioned platform adjoining the
court with about a dozen other prisoners, his appearance has changed
dramatically since he entered Sharjah’s Al Gharb jail four months
earlier. He has lost about 10 kilograms and his head is shaved.

“At
least he has his own clothes and not this blue prison jumpsuit like his
cellmates,” says Mrs Sassen. “I bring him new clothes every week.”

The
guards remove Mr Sassen’s handcuffs, but after two hours time has run
out for his case to be heard this day. “We did not have time to read
through his file,” the judge tells Mrs Sassen in a soft voice. “Don’t
worry, we will reschedule it.”

Two weeks later the same judge
found Mr Sassen not guilty of one of his charges. Two remaining charges
have been transferred to the Dubai courts.

“I am very happy
because he will now be transferred to Dubai for his two other bounced
cheques,” Mrs Sassen says. “I have heard that the new regulations now
in Dubai will make bounced cheques no longer criminal cases and are
being transferred to a committee. Maybe he will be able to get out of
jail.”But, even if he is freed, his future is not clear.

Whatever
the amount, bouncing a cheque becomes a criminal offence in the
Emirates if the payee files a case with the police, says David Nunn, a
partner with the law firm Simmons and Simmons. Each offence carries a
sentence of up to three years’ jail.A bounced cheque is always
considered to be fraud no matter the circumstances. The system dates
back to the early days of trading on Dubai Creek, when sellers of
spices and garments had no security for payment other than a signed
cheque.

More than 500,000 cheques bounced in the first four
months of this year, Central Bank data show. That represents about 5.6
per cent of almost 10 million cheques issued during the period.

Last
month, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid, the Vice President of the UAE and
Ruler of Dubai, issued a decree to form a new judicial committee that
will examine cases of bounced cheques relating to property purchases
and leases in Dubai. Instead of being investigated by police or
prosecuted, tenants and homeowners will first be referred to the
committee.

For prisoners such as Mr Sassen, the committee remains a hope.Thousands
of people who invested in property during the boom are at risk of
losing their money because many developers have been unable to proceed
with their projects.

In some cases, developers made promises of huge financial returns using postdated cheques as ­guarantees.

Developers
also write postdated cheques for land. Investors also use postdated
cheques, most commonly as a guarantee to banks and other lenders that
mortgage repayments would be made. But when there are no funds to cover
them, the consequences can be serious.

“We are sleeping here
directly on the floor with just a wool blanket,” Mr Sassen tells The
National in a telephone interview from prison. He can make one
telephone call a day.

“There are no chairs to sit on and we have
to eat with our fingers. We can go out in the prison yard only once a
week for 10 to 40 minutes.”Mr Sassen says he is not the type to run
away: “I wanted to face it because I am not a criminal. But they just
saw the bounced cheque and that was it.”There are plenty of other
examples. The wife of an Indian developer based in Dubai says: “My
husband is sitting in Al Aweer jail and is having hearings for
different cheque cases almost every day.”

Peter Margetts, a
British property developer with a project in the Jumeirah Village
development Dubai, was arrested in January and sentenced to 20 years’
jail over several bounced cheques.

In Ras al Khaimah, Frank
Khoie, the chief executive of Khoie Properties, the developer behind
the La Hoya Bay project, was sentenced to three years in jail for
bouncing a Dh57 million (US$15.5m) cheque that was issued to a unit of
the RAK Government.

The collapse of property prices has had a
severe impact on Ajman, where many developments were launched just
before the market started to tumble. As a consequence, many developers
have been arrested over bad cheques.

“Everybody is now playing
against each other. They all used to be such good friends,” says Jayaid
Malik, an architect based in Ajman. “Many of my 60 to 70 clients are
now either in jail or have just ran away. They owe me about Dh60m in
total. But thank God I have no bounced cheque myself and I am not in
jail.

“Once I visited one of my clients in a Dubai jail,” he
says. “There were all kinds of beautiful sports cars parked outside. I
was thinking these people made so much money and now they are sitting
together with criminals. It is a very bad situation.”Others have fled the country to avoid answering charges over cheques they had written.

Sam
Rasool, the founder of PIR Developers, another Ajman-based broker, left
the country after launching five towers and bouncing several cheques.He says he has opened a new business in Islamabad where he now lives and he hopes to raise enough money to repay his debts.

“My
master developer asked me to come back to try and help them solve the
problem,” he says. “But unless the criminal offences are turned to
civil litigation, I just cannot.”

Such cases prompted the decree creating the special committee on the issue.Ahmed
Ibrahim Saif, the chief justice of the Dubai Criminal Courts, says the
committee to be created will look into cheque cases related to property
transactions. The decree restricts the cases to property buyers and
tenants.

Some cases have already been transferred to the entity even before it has been formed.

Shariq
Imran Khan, the Pakistani developer behind what was intended to be the
tallest tower in Ajman, is in the Dubai Central Jail awaiting a hearing
for charges relating to bounced cheques and has had one of his cases
transferred to this new committee, says Yasir al Naqbi, his lawyer from
Excel Advocates and Legal Consultants.

The surge in official
complaints against developers and property brokers has meant that some
police stations are already refusing to take criminal claims for
property issues, local lawyers say.

“Some prosecutors are also refusing the claims,” says Maroun Saab, a lawyer at Habib Al Mulla in Dubai.

While
the new committee may help remove the bottleneck in the court system it
is unlikely to represent a quick fix for developers who have written
cheques that have bounced, says Karim Nassif, a partner at Habid Al
Mulla.

He says the committee will be able to do only one of
three things. “Either they will invalidate the cheque or they will
order the purchaser to issue new cheques, for instance if there is a
construction but there is a delay or a new payment schedule linked to
construction; or they will simply send it back to the competing
jurisdiction which is normally the criminal one.”

“People are
asking me when they will be able to get out of jail,” says Ingvild
Moritsch, an Austrian lawyer based in Dubai. “But things do not happen
like that. Nobody in fact has a clear idea yet of how the new entity
will work.”

France defends reactor design

A nuclear power plant in Australia: the UAE hopes to have its own atomic energy plant by 2017. Ian Waldy

A
French government official has dismissed concerns about a nuclear
reactor design that the country’s firms hope to build in the UAE, after
European regulators asked for changes.

The regulatory agencies
of France, Britain and Finland on Monday asked Areva, the builder, to
make improvements to the design of the French reactor, known as the
EPR, by June of next year. It highlighted the potential for
interference between two reactor control systems, which could
compromise safety.

Anne-Marie Idrac, the French minister of state for foreign trade,
said on a visit to Abu Dhabi the letter was “quite banal, a quite
ordinary one in the process of constructing plants”.

A French
consortium including Areva, Electricite de France (EDF), GDF Suez and
Total is one of three teams vying for an estimated US$39 billion
(Dh143.24bn) contract to build and operate a fleet of nuclear reactors
in the UAE. The initial contract is expected to be awarded soon.

Ms Idrac said the changes outlined by regulators would apply to the
reactor under construction at Flamanville, France, which “is a
reference in our offer for the project for the UAE”. France would
answer the regulators’ concerns this year, she added.

The first reactor in the UAE would not be operational before 2017.

In
a letter, the regulators said: “The issue is primarily around ensuring
the adequacy of the safety systems … and their independence from
control systems.

“Independence
is important because, if a safety system provides protection against
the failure of a control system, then they should not fail together.

“The
EPR design, as originally proposed … doesn’t comply with the
independence principle, as there is a very high degree of
interconnectivity between the control and safety systems.”

The
French consortium, which presented its bid in July, is competing
against groups from South Korea and Japan for a contract to build an
initial pair of reactors in Abu Dhabi that is likely to be expanded to
include a fleet of the same design. US firms have a minority interest
in both bids.

Ms Idrac characterised the regulators’ concerns as a question, not a
problem, and said it did not relate to the core of the system, but only
the instrumental control.

“It is of course important but it is not the core,” she said.

Mr
Idrac said the public release of the letter showed the French
commitment to transparency in the nuclear process, a requirement
stressed by UAE officials.

“The letter signed by the three
nuclear safety authorities of Finland, the UK and France is a new proof
of transparency in terms of safety and security,” she said.

An Emirati collection starts life in France

ABU
DHABI // In its present state, the patch of Saadiyat Island on which
the Louvre will eventually sit reveals little about its future.

Only
a few thousand workers are on site as the preparatory work on Saadiyat
starts. Not until 2013 will the futuristic dome of the Louvre Abu Dhabi
be complete.

Work is already well under way some 3,300 miles away in Paris, where
the first steps are being taken to decide which art will fill the
museum’s 8,000 square metres of exhibition space.

Speaking
before yesterday’s unveiling of the first artworks that will grace the
new museum, Christine Albanel, France’s minister of culture and
communication, said the Louvre would seek to strike the right balance
between its French heritage and its new surroundings.

Even though the expertise, the name and the brand are all French,
the museum will be distinctly Emirati; the final decisions on the
collection will be taken in Abu Dhabi.

The gallery will have an
annual budget for purchases, on top of what has been spent on acquiring
the Louvre name and the 30-year deal to host artworks from France.

“We
need to do a project which is a universal museum and one that covers
all periods while achieving a coherence,” said Mrs Albanel.

She
said the Louvre Abu Dhabi was “a great adventure which I believe in,
and is in fact unique in the world”, adding that it was “an investment
in culture and knowledge”.

From the French side, the project is
being managed by Agence France-Museums, a body that comprises 12
institutions including the Louvre, the Musée d’Orsay, the Centre
Pompidou and the Bibliothèque Nationale de France.

Established
in July 2007, it is responsible for sculpting the ethos of the Louvre
Abu Dhabi. From next year it will start training UAE staff in the way
of the Louvre.

Bruno Maquart, the agency’s chief executive, said it would help
Emirati authorities conceive the Louvre and, during the first years at
least, support the museum in its “cultural, technical and
organisational aspects”.

He said he was in almost daily
contact with the Tourism Development and Investment Company (TDIC) the
developer of Saadiyat Island.

As well as working with the
architect Jean Nouvel, the agency is identifying artworks that will
“give this universal museum its own artistic and cultural personality”.

However, Mr Maquart said the core collection would not be complete by the time the museum opened in 2013.

“When
it opens, you will have 6,000 square metres dedicated to showing the
permanent collections,” he said. “There you will find pieces lent by
French museums as well as pieces from the UAE collection.

“But
acquiring pieces for a museum takes time. This is why, during the first
10 years, there will be loans from France and after 10 years, the Abu
Dhabi collection will occupy the area.

“There will also be 2,000 square metres for temporary exhibitions, as in any other museum.”

Art used in the temporary exhibitions will come from museums all over France, not just the Louvre.

Mrs
Albanel said: “Certain pieces will also be lent by the Louvre in Paris.
There will be temporary exhibitions for something like three months, as
with any temporary exhibition, and there will be loans of pieces over
two years. This is part of the governmental agreement.

To build up the permanent collection, a committee made up of the
curators of some of France’s largest museums will meet three times a
year to discuss which artworks to recommend for purchase by the Louvre
Abu Dhabi.

These recommendations will then be passed on to the TDIC, which will give final approval on all purchases.

The
issue, said Christophe Tardieu, a co-director of the cabinet with
France’s Ministry of Culture and Communication, was selecting works of
only the highest quality.

Mr Maquart said: “We advise the Emirati partners on the constitution
of the collection, which must be coherent with the museum and the
spirit of the museum.

“The Louvre is seen here as the museum
of museums, it is the largest in the world. So we want both to follow
this tradition and create an original, 21st-century, universal museum
for Abu Dhabi that puts into contrast the art of yesterday and today.

“It won’t be a museum of classical art. It will include the
contemporary period and living artists. It will not only focus on
western art but also on Arabic and Muslim art, as well as Asian arts.

“The idea is to show and compare what has been done in the world at the same time and in different areas.

“It
is to reinvent a universal museum that is adapted to this country,
which is at the crossroads of east and west and which intends to play a
key role in the region.

“This is not an extension to the Louvre Paris. We are speaking about
agreements with a completely different museum that will bear the name
during 30 years but is an Emirati museum. We are only bringing the
know-how.

“The training will be done by the Louvre in Paris. It
will have the quality of the Louvre, with the working methods of the
Louvre. It will be different but very close.”

Work on training
future Louvre staff selected from Abu Dhabi will begin next year, Mrs
Albanel confirmed. “The first internships in France will start next
year. People from the Emirates will come to the Louvre and different
French museums and will be trained to the approach to the public, for
instance.”

She said the French ministry was in talks to establish higher
education projects in institutions, including the Abu Dhabi Sorbonne,
to create a master’s degree in arts professions.

Education of
another sort will also feature prominently on the agenda. Mrs Albanel
said: “Within the Abu Dhabi Louvre there will be a section dedicated
only to children. We call it the children’s museum.

“The children will come with their families or with the school. We want to work with the schools here and transfer experiences.”

The project is still some way from completion, but events such as
Talking Art: Louvre Abu Dhabi, artparis-Abu Dhabi and the Picasso
exhibition at the Emirates Palace hotel over the last year are helping
build expectation and knowledge of art in Abu Dhabi.

More taster
events are planned, Mrs Albanel said, and a semi-permanent Louvre
presence can be expected in Abu Dhabi before the opening of the museum
itself.

“All these projects have created big expectations. The idea of these
pre-exhibitions is also to give more reality to these projects.

“It will become very concrete and increase their attractiveness to the people of Abu Dhabi.”

Critics have lost battle, says minister

ABU
DHABI // Critics of the decision to open a branch of the Louvre in the
UAE have been proved wrong, according to the French minister of culture
and communication.

The January 2007 agreement to build the
Louvre Abu Dhabi was greeted with widespread criticism within the
French art world. Some critics expressed fears that key works might be
lent to the new museum.

But as further details of the development have been unveiled, the criticism has become more muted.

In
February 2007, a motion signed by 39 curators of the Louvre calling for
a reversal of the Abu Dhabi deal was handed to the then minister of
culture and communication, Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres.

An online
petition started by Didier Rykner, a French art historian and editor of
the online art journal La Tribune d’Art, was signed by more than 5,100
people, among them art lecturers and historians.

Last year Mr Rykner told The National his battle to stop works leaving France had been lost.

He
added: “I intend looking very closely at how this will happen, which
works will be sent, which will be bought, and whether regional museums
will be forced to send their works to Abu Dhabi against their will. I
will remain vigilant.”

The culture minister, Christine Albanel, said: “The criticism has stopped now. There is a large consensus about the project.